Though the Instant Pot has been on the scene for years, cookbooks devoted to the pressure cooker really took off in 2017—two Instant Pot cookbooks landed on our list of the top 10 best selling cookbooks of the year. When we previewed Instant Pot-specific titles last fall, the official Instant Pot community on Facebook had 600,000 members. Less than a year later, that number has jumped to 1.4 million members. To keep on top of the ever-growing trend, publishers are spinning off from more generalized recipe collections into specialized Instant Pot cookbooks.
Several new titles hitting shelves in the coming months gear the gadget toward a specific cuisine, like Ann Mah’s Instantly French (St. Martin’s, Sept.). In it, Mah, author of the 2013 memoir Mastering the Art of French Eating, covers French staples from cassoulet to crème brulée.
“Home cooks in France have been using pressure cookers, literally, for centuries since the forerunner of the device was invented there in the seventeenth century,” said SMP executive editor Michael Flamini. “When Ann Mah suggested that Instant Pot devotees could make boeuf bourguignon, coq au vin, pate, onion soup and many other French classics with the beloved Instant Pot in a fraction of the time it takes to make them in a regular oven, I was on board and knew others would be, too."
Forthcoming cuisine-based titles from Ten Speed include The Essential Mexican Instant Pot Cookbook (Oct.) by Deborah Schneider and The Essential Indian Instant Pot Cookbook (Oct.) by Archana Mundhe. “The promise of a fast, healthy, homemade meal is irresistible, and cooks across America have fallen in love with the Instant Pot to deliver,” said Hannah Rahill, v-p and publishing director at Ten Speed. Rahill pointed out that while the first few cookbooks that caught on with consumers offered “tried-and-true” classic comfort food recipes, the sustained interest in the Instant Pot has created a need for more diversity. “Now people are using the appliance so often, they’re looking for fresh ideas and authentic international flavors to bring to their table,” she added.
Page Street will be releasing Manali Singh’s Vegetarian Indian Cooking with Your Instant Pot and Emily Sunwell-Vidaurri and Rudy Vidaurri’s Mexican Cooking with Your Instant Pot in October and January, respectively. “We've definitely seen that the Instant Pot is a force to be reckoned with,” said Page Street acquisitions and editorial manager Marissa Giambelluca. “It's a lazy person's dream because you can cook straight from frozen, you can brown meat right in the pot, you can make a flavorful meal in minutes and in a mostly hands-off way...The boom in Instant Pot cookbooks shows that there is a strong readership using the appliance, and I definitely don't see it dying down anytime soon.”
In January 2017, Page Street fused two cooking trends with Paleo Cooking With Your Instant Pot by Jennifer Robins, which Giambelluca said addressed a “hole in the market of people who appreciate the wonders of the appliance, but still need help navigating it with the specific ingredients they can use.” Robins’ Affordable Paleo Cooking with Your Instant Pot will go on sale in September. “Diets are hard to stick to, so people really appreciate not only an appliance that makes it easier, but also a cookbook that makes it foolproof,” added Giambelluca. To reach time-strapped home cooks, Page Street will be publishing Cooking from Frozen in Your Instant Pot by Kristy Bernardo in October.
Other publishers aiming for the health conscious Instant Pot devotee include Harvard Common Press, who has The Gluten-Free Instant Pot Cookbook (Sept.) by Jane Bonacci and Sara De Leeuw; Victory Belt with Keto Instant Pot (Dec.) by Maria Emmerich; and Alpha Books, who is publishing The Healthy Instant Pot Cookbook (Oct.) by Dana Angelo White.
Additional Instant Pot spin off books include Melissa Clark’s Comfort in an Instant (Clarkson Potter, Oct.), which focuses on comfort food like Weeknight Chicken Parm and Matzo Ball Soup, and follows Dinner in and Instant, released last fall. Sterling Epicure will publish The Instant Pot Ultimate Sous Vide Cookbook (Oct.) and The Instant Pot Holiday Cookbook (Oct.) by Heather Schlueter.
